It is known to hydroform tubular components or members. Hydroformed tubular members are becoming increasingly popular in automotive body structural applications. During vehicle body manufacturing, many of the hydroformed tubular members are used in vehicle body and chassis applications. However, vehicle strength, stiffness, and/or impactworthiness often necessitate the need for local areas of structural reinforcement to meet their design goals.
Tube sealing is a major factor in the tube hydroform process. Seal units may be mounted on nitrogen powered elevators. The tube is filled (fill pressure) and the round tube is stuffed into the die cavity to bottom. Press tonnage is applied and form pressure is initiated forming the tube to the cavity. This process eliminates the need for a pre-form die operation.
When the seal units do not directly oppose one another, the pneumatic clamp devices do not provide capability to hold the bent tube into proper position. When finish part geometry changes round tube near seals, the tubes tend to move within the sealing process (creating sealing inefficiencies).
As a result, it is desirable to provide a new hydroform die tube holding device. It is also desirable to provide a hydroformed tubular member that is locally and internally reinforced prior to the hydroforming process. It is further desirable to provide a method of locally and internally reinforcing a hydroformed tubular member. Therefore, there is a need in the art to provide a new hydroform die tube holding assembly and method of making same that meets these desires.